• Tough times for those convicted of and those still facing investigation for phone hacking. And all the more distressing because it could have been avoided. The paperback edition of Power Trip, a memoir by Gordon Brown’s one-time lieutenant Damian McBride, includes material omitted from the hardback so as not to prejudice the trials of Rebekah Brooks and others. There’s new stuff about Brooks’s power as the boss of News International. She apparently warned Gordon Brown – via McBride – not to cross her if he wanted to reach Downing Street, and seemed preoccupied with the need for prison ships. She also seemed keen that Sir Paul Stephenson should become Met commissioner. He did, but later resigned amid disquiet about his links to News International. We also learn that, given a hearing, McBride could have changed the course of history. When Ed Miliband began agitating for action on phone hacking, the adviser feared the result would be disaster for Labour and devised a middle way. “I drew up a plan for parliament to legislate an amnesty from criminal proceedings for any individuals or organisations who came forward within a certain time period and admitted their involvement in phone hacking, and also a cap on damages that any of their victims could claim.” But the idea was batted away. “The clear answer came back... Ed’s decided to go for the jugular.” On such fates turn.

• More evidence, meanwhile, that the prime minister will have to sing for his supper if he wants anything other than a half-hearted endorsement from the Sun at the next election. The paper warned him there would be hell to pay if he did not do better on Europe. Rupert Murdoch has tweeted disobligingly about him. And now, in the standoff between the prime minister and Baroness Warsi, the Sun lauds Warsi. “No sooner had Baroness Warsi resigned over Gaza than the briefings started,” it said. “She was over-promoted, she was in a non-job, she was a token appointment. But none of that is remotely important.” She did the right thing, it says. “She resigned from the government because of her principles.” A bashing, too, for George Osborne. “Yes chancellor, of course the welfare budget ... should be cut ... but it’s on your watch that the bill is set to soar to £203bn.” Things would never have unravelled like this in Rebekah’s day.

• So the wait is over. Boris Johnson announces he will probably seek a Commons seat in 2015 and combine being an honourable member with his London mayoralty until at least 2016. There is a precedent. Ken Livingstone held both posts for a year. He tells us he had to. “I would have stood down right away but if I had done that, Labour would have imposed a candidate.” He employed a caseworker, but it wasn’t ideal. A much easier prospect for Johnson, he says. “He doesn’t really do the mayoral job anyway.”

• Labour’s former minister, curry aficionado and gagmeister Frank Dobson prepares to bow out from parliament offering words of advice. We must convince voters we can make a difference, he says, relating a tale of his predecessor, Labour MP Lena Jeger. “She goes to the top of a block and when Mrs Smith comes to the door, Lena launches into the great leftwing issue of the day – German rearmament and its threat to international peace.” Lena pauses for breath and the woman asks: “Can you stop ’em pissing in our lift?” Lena replies: “No, I don’t think I can”, to which Mrs Smith says: “Well, if you can’t stop them pissing in our lift, how can you expect me to believe you can stop the Germans re-arming?” Never underestimate the Smiths.

• Finally, the referendum debate spills into the Edinburgh festival. The actor David Hayman, performing in The Pitiless Storm, about a Labour activist uncertain which way to vote, took questions after the show. He referred to the welcome received by English competitors at the Commonwealth Games. What television didn’t show, he said, happened afterwards, when spectators were asked where they were from. “Malaysia,” said one. She received friendly applause, as did all foreign visitors. It was only when a woman answered “Edinburgh” that 40,000 Glaswegians booed.